Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from how Stuff Works
Speaker 1: dot com. Hey, welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark,
Speaker 1: and there's Charles w Chuck Bryant, and there's Jerry over there,
Speaker 1: and this is stuff you should know about Smoking Hitler,
Speaker 1: Smoking Hitler. Well, you know what's funny is uh, what's
Speaker 1: funny about? Assessin? Well? I I got this idea because
Speaker 1: I had listened to the recent friendly Fire podcast episode
Speaker 1: on Valkyrie. Boy, you're just going all out on friendly Fire,
Speaker 1: aren't it? Like it? Okay, it's good show, um, and
Speaker 1: there aren't many people that know more about history than
Speaker 1: John Roderick, Like, it's really impressive to hear that guy
Speaker 1: go off like from the dome. No, I know, it's
Speaker 1: got quite a brain. And hey, Ben Harrison's no slouch either.
Speaker 1: He's a little bit of a slouch. He's listening to this,
Speaker 1: so I gotta rib him. But John at one point
Speaker 1: in the show was like, I can't like this. You'll
Speaker 1: see in the show it's such a convoluted plan to
Speaker 1: blow up Hitler. And he's just like, I can't believe
Speaker 1: in all those years they couldn't get one one person
Speaker 1: to walk up and shoot him in the head. I
Speaker 1: saw that to um in a couple of places, and
Speaker 1: it is very vexing and perplexing. Then not one person
Speaker 1: said and apparently people agreed to suicide missions. A lot
Speaker 1: of people wanted to kill him, but personally they just
Speaker 1: didn't go. They didn't go. But that what sound? Is
Speaker 1: it like a luger make? I don't even know. I
Speaker 1: don't know. I can tell you what a dye in
Speaker 1: German sounds like when they're falling off a building. Oh
Speaker 1: is that the vilhelm screen? Well, we wouldn't put the
Speaker 1: right one in anyway, so I forget. Yeah, anyway, it
Speaker 1: just seems odd to me that because there were I
Speaker 1: think fifteen or sixteen total plots to assassinate Hitler, and
Speaker 1: I don't know if there wasn't a single one that
Speaker 1: was like you take a gun, walk up behind him
Speaker 1: at his desk and shoot him in the head, and
Speaker 1: then shoot yourself because it's going to go really badly
Speaker 1: for you, right, Yeah, I mean they were all suicide missions, mostly,
Speaker 1: not all of them, apparently. So Um, I was surprised
Speaker 1: because I didn't realize. I think I had heard, like,
Speaker 1: you know, people had wanted to assassinate Hitler or something
Speaker 1: like that. I didn't realize that Hitler was about his
Speaker 1: charmed human being as far as surviving assassination tempts goes
Speaker 1: as they come. Um, just didn't realize that, would you say,
Speaker 1: like maybe fifteen sixteen plus this one? Okay? Um? And
Speaker 1: I mean like there were close calls, like somewhere you know,
Speaker 1: he just missed his assassination by a couple of minutes
Speaker 1: or a bomb didn't go off even though it was
Speaker 1: fully functioning and should have been blown his plane out
Speaker 1: of the sky. That's the contro bottle or whatever. So
Speaker 1: it's not like he he went on as their fear
Speaker 1: for lack of trying. It just didn't happen for some reason.
Speaker 1: The assassination attempt that that most people think of when
Speaker 1: they think of attempts to assassinate Hitler, especially if you're
Speaker 1: a fan of Tom Cruise, especially if you're a fan
Speaker 1: of Tom Cruise dressed as a pirate. Um is uh
Speaker 1: the the Operation Valkyrie that we're about to talk about.
Speaker 1: I watched that again today, and what do you think
Speaker 1: of this time around? It's good. I like it. I
Speaker 1: like the Cruise. It's the accent things weird, But you
Speaker 1: just gotta get past it. He uh I saw. There
Speaker 1: was like a pretty big outcry from Germans when he
Speaker 1: was cast, when it was announced that he was going
Speaker 1: to play class fund Stauffenberg because Klass von Stauffenbergers will
Speaker 1: see as a national hero of Germany, and Germany does
Speaker 1: not take kindly to scientology. It's yeah. They were not
Speaker 1: really happy when Tom Cruises cast to play their national hero.
Speaker 1: They said, crew, that was great. Thanks, so July, yes, like,
Speaker 1: do you want to do the whole plan right here?
Speaker 1: Like we're working this out right, okay, alright, alright, new
Speaker 1: new new plans or just like what happened. I've got it,
Speaker 1: I've got it. We're gonna take a totally different tech
Speaker 1: you already okay. So this Operation Valkyrie that we're talking about,
Speaker 1: it took place. It was a called the July twenty
Speaker 1: plot is what it's called. But the operation was actually
Speaker 1: something larger than that, and as we'll see, it entailed
Speaker 1: a lot of people. And these were like high ranking
Speaker 1: military officials, some of the highest military officials in the
Speaker 1: German military, the Wehrmacht, saying that right, we're involved in
Speaker 1: a plot to assassinate Hitler, and uh, ed put this
Speaker 1: together for us any points out like, there are a
Speaker 1: lot of reasons people had to want to assassinate Hitler.
Speaker 1: There was people who said, you know, uh, we're what
Speaker 1: we're doing with the the extermination of the Jews and
Speaker 1: other people is is like completely unconscionable and this needs
Speaker 1: to have an end put to it. I think that
Speaker 1: was mostly Kenneth branna Right, if we're going movie style, okay, um,
Speaker 1: like in real life though he supposedly was the one that, yeah,
Speaker 1: I had the true conscience of what they were doing
Speaker 1: was wrong. Who who did he play? Trust Trust Cow?
Speaker 1: He's it's a tough one, Henning von Trush Cow Trust
Speaker 1: t r E s c. K Ow. I'm pretty sure
Speaker 1: I got that right, that that was the Kenneth Branno character,
Speaker 1: and he genuinely was opposed to how they were doing
Speaker 1: things right, Okay, So um, there was at least one
Speaker 1: person who felt that way, but he was very much
Speaker 1: in the minority. Yeah. There were another group of people
Speaker 1: who thought, well, you know, these Nazis, they're kind of upstarts.
Speaker 1: They're like nouveaux reiche politically speaking. Yeah, um, and they
Speaker 1: don't really care about the old Guard well, I'm part
Speaker 1: of the old Guard. My family landed gentry in Germany.
Speaker 1: We have a nice tradition going back hundreds of years,
Speaker 1: and now these Nazi up starts are moving my family
Speaker 1: out of power. We're no longer in the elite, and
Speaker 1: I don't like that. That's another reason why people wanted
Speaker 1: to get Yeah, and I think they were, like the
Speaker 1: majority of the people in this plot were those people
Speaker 1: like they weren't idealist democratic people who wanted like they
Speaker 1: were just trying to protect their heritage. Some of them
Speaker 1: were anti fascists, not all of them, but then there
Speaker 1: was definitely a through line that a lot of people
Speaker 1: bought into and may have even been a major motivator
Speaker 1: for a lot of people to um. By the time
Speaker 1: July rolled around, it was very clear to most people,
Speaker 1: uh inside of Germany and out who were paying attention
Speaker 1: and who knew everything, that Germany could not win World
Speaker 1: War two any longer. After Normandy it was dead exactly
Speaker 1: the water Yeah, um, when once we made it to Normandy,
Speaker 1: it was it was over. And not only have we
Speaker 1: made it to Normandy by this time, but we we
Speaker 1: had supplies coming in, we had more and more troops
Speaker 1: coming in we were overrunning Europe. Now Europe was was ours.
Speaker 1: Plus the Russians were moving their way westward from the east.
Speaker 1: Not a good position for Germany to be in between
Speaker 1: the Allies and the Russians. Um Italy, Mussolini had been overthrown.
Speaker 1: So Italy was now this soft underbelly, as Winston Churchill
Speaker 1: put it, that could be attacked from Africa. Was he
Speaker 1: gone by this time? He was a puppet dictator in
Speaker 1: the northern part of Italy that was protected by Germany
Speaker 1: because the most of Italy was gone. The movie may
Speaker 1: be wrong, but the movie they were like Mussolini's coming
Speaker 1: for lunch or whatever. That's true. But he had lost
Speaker 1: most of Italy by this time. But that left Italy
Speaker 1: exposed to attack from Africa, and Africa had just recently
Speaker 1: been lost by Rommel. So Germany was in no position
Speaker 1: to win World War two. So there were a lot
Speaker 1: of people, high ranking officials in the military. You said, Okay,
Speaker 1: before they actually make their way into Germany, that's a
Speaker 1: point of no return. Maybe we can get it a
Speaker 1: hitler and negotiate a peace that that keeps our republic intact. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and supposedly had even spoken to some of the Allied
Speaker 1: leaders like, hey, let's just say Hitler was not around,
Speaker 1: just just hypothetically, what would that look like for for
Speaker 1: the rest of us, Like, how could we come out
Speaker 1: of this? Okay? Yeah, uh, no one knows truly how.
Speaker 1: I don't know how far down the road those talks went,
Speaker 1: but it had been mentioned. So the supposedly their point
Speaker 1: of contact was Alan Dulles, one of the Dullest brothers
Speaker 1: who would later overthrow the um government of Guatemala, among
Speaker 1: other things, as CIA director the airport Dulless. Yea interesting,
Speaker 1: same dulless As, But that's who they were talking to.
Speaker 1: He was like the CIA or the OSS station chief
Speaker 1: of Switzerland at the time. But I think the Germans
Speaker 1: were like, Okay, we will do this and we'll get
Speaker 1: rid of Hitler and we want to remain, you know,
Speaker 1: keep Germany intact. But the Russians cannot be part of
Speaker 1: the peace talks. We've done some things that they're not
Speaker 1: very happy about and they can't be part of it.
Speaker 1: And the Allies wouldn't wouldn't take that off of the table. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because if the Russians were in there negotiating, it would
Speaker 1: be a much different story for Germany. So all of
Speaker 1: these guys knew that Germany could not win the war. Hitler,
Speaker 1: who was running the show, still had very different ideas.
Speaker 1: His idea of fighting this war was, We're going to
Speaker 1: fight this war until the very last German is killed.
Speaker 1: Every man, woman, child who can pick up a gun
Speaker 1: is going to fight to the death against these invaders
Speaker 1: of our homeland. And and I'm totally out of my
Speaker 1: mind and I'm taking the whole country down with me. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And in the in the Vulkyrie film, they even say, like,
Speaker 1: you know, with the Normandy going on and what's happened there,
Speaker 1: and he's just sort of like, well, I don't know
Speaker 1: what you're talking about. Everything's going great, right, give me
Speaker 1: some more crystal meth? Did he do that? That's the
Speaker 1: legend that that crystal meth was invented by Nazi scientists,
Speaker 1: and that upper echelon Nazis were all into that big time. Man,
Speaker 1: there's so many, like of all the people in history,
Speaker 1: like so many things that are horrific and true, and
Speaker 1: then so many weird stories from like Nazi treasure hunting
Speaker 1: to crystal meth addiction. It's just crazy. I wrote a
Speaker 1: really interesting new Yorker article about people who treasure hunt
Speaker 1: for Nazi treasures in Poland in the mountains of Poland.
Speaker 1: And the thing that gives gravity to these claims is
Speaker 1: that there really are enormous tunnels in the mountains in
Speaker 1: Poland that you could fit train folds of gold in
Speaker 1: and um, they think that they actually might have something
Speaker 1: to them, even though that's supposedly a hoax, the Nazi
Speaker 1: gold thing, supposedly, but again, they have these tunnel networks
Speaker 1: that are like, really there. It's not like there are
Speaker 1: the tunnels themselves are urban legend. It's just these tunnel
Speaker 1: networks are so expansive that no one's ever app them all, gotcha,
Speaker 1: But they do exist. So there may be a gold
Speaker 1: rich poss wing that no one's ever found. Yeah. Interesting,
Speaker 1: So wow, that was a lot. Do you want to
Speaker 1: take a break and then get into it, tomorre you're
Speaker 1: ready to keep plugging along? No, man, let's uh, let's
Speaker 1: talk about killing Hitler right after this. So Hitler. Uh.
Speaker 1: Hitler had done a lot up into this point to
Speaker 1: have total control over Germany and over the state, whether
Speaker 1: it was controlling what news went out to, having people
Speaker 1: swear oaths of loyalty to him as a person, not Germany,
Speaker 1: like it really at me today, the Hyle Hitler thing
Speaker 1: like soldiers saying Hyle Hitler to one another when Hitler
Speaker 1: is not around. It's not like I would understand if like, well,
Speaker 1: sure you'd do that to Hitler. But he was having
Speaker 1: them do that to everyone. It wasn't like long lived Germany.
Speaker 1: It was Heil Hitler. And they're like, he's nowhere near here,
Speaker 1: are you realize? You're like, yeah, but we gotta say
Speaker 1: this otherwise we're toasted. And I think over time, like
Speaker 1: even when you are forced to do that or kind
Speaker 1: of brainwashed into doing there or whatever, you kind of
Speaker 1: adopt that that sense, like like the eagerness. You know
Speaker 1: it's weird. It's because it's just it's bizarre. It is bizarre. Um.
Speaker 1: The other thing we should mention really quickly too, before
Speaker 1: we move on, is the the sipping hoft uh. This
Speaker 1: was an ancient Middle Aged blood law basically where they
Speaker 1: say from Germany, where they were like, you know, if
Speaker 1: you're guilty of a crime, your whole family is. And
Speaker 1: as you will see, Project Valkyrie was reason enough for
Speaker 1: for Himler to dust that off. Say, remember that ancient custom. Well,
Speaker 1: we're just gonna do it here. Yeah, it wasn't even
Speaker 1: further back than that to like the second century BC.
Speaker 1: From what I saw, it's crazy. So it's basically the
Speaker 1: idea is, if you are a trader, that means you
Speaker 1: have traitorous blood in you, and since you've passed your
Speaker 1: bloodline along, then all of the members of your family
Speaker 1: must have that same traitor as blood. So the whole
Speaker 1: family has to be wiped out. That's the idea behind it.
Speaker 1: It's not clear if Himler just made this up or whatever,
Speaker 1: but there was that threat of of if you do
Speaker 1: something to um put the family into to to put
Speaker 1: yourself in jeopardy, you put the whole family in jeopardy.
Speaker 1: People like basically spying on not just their neighbors, but
Speaker 1: on their own family members. Yeah, and if you want
Speaker 1: to hatch a plot to kill Hitler, then that puts
Speaker 1: your family at risk exactly, not just yourself. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: then plus also um the the it's you can't really
Speaker 1: discount the that he really thoroughly controlled the media. So
Speaker 1: if there was a resistance, if there were people who
Speaker 1: did great acts of protest or whatever, it would just
Speaker 1: be lost. It would not be reported on, and so
Speaker 1: whatever spark they created couldn't grow into a flame. So
Speaker 1: there was a tremendous amount of control. And even today
Speaker 1: historians are still debating how complicit the actual people of
Speaker 1: Germany were and how much they were coerced into following Hitler.
Speaker 1: It's a it's a real bone of contention among historians today. Well,
Speaker 1: I'm sure it was a very mixed bag of allegiances
Speaker 1: and loyalties and like what people truly believed in what
Speaker 1: they were, you know, they weren't getting the real information anyway,
Speaker 1: you know exactly. And then that on top of the
Speaker 1: whole family is going to get wiped out if you
Speaker 1: do something could keep people in line, alright. So the
Speaker 1: Operation Valkyrie itself, like we said, killing Hitler was a
Speaker 1: small part, well not a small part, a major part,
Speaker 1: But Operation Valkyrie itself was a larger plan uh to
Speaker 1: rest control of of the German government basically from the
Speaker 1: Nazis and the s S. Yeah, it was an existing
Speaker 1: operation that got co opted and made a part of
Speaker 1: the plot to assassinate Hitler because they knew that just
Speaker 1: killing Hitler wasn't enough, because someone I guess Hitler would
Speaker 1: have just stepped in this place. Yeah, there's evidence that
Speaker 1: Himmler knew about this plot and basically letting it happen
Speaker 1: so he could do of course. So uh, here was
Speaker 1: a deal. Operation Valkyrie was a contingency plan and this
Speaker 1: was set up with Hitler's signature, uh, to control the
Speaker 1: reserve army of Germany. So there was basically I couldn't
Speaker 1: tell if it was like our reserves over here. I
Speaker 1: don't know. It wasn't quite like that because they maybe
Speaker 1: like the National Guard, you think, yeah, because it says
Speaker 1: that they were called up to um to support the front,
Speaker 1: and you call up the National Guards sometimes here in
Speaker 1: the United States, right, Yeah, I think it was. It
Speaker 1: would be like, well, they were the remnants of the
Speaker 1: German army that was left back. They were the army
Speaker 1: that was still in Germany at this point. They weren't
Speaker 1: out fighting and on the front lines, although they could
Speaker 1: be called. They were there to defend Germany. Yeah, exactly. So, Uh,
Speaker 1: if the call came through and Operation Valkyrie was enacted,
Speaker 1: that basically meant that something's gone wrong, and not necessarily
Speaker 1: the Hitler's dead, but um, something's gone wrong and that
Speaker 1: army needs to mobilize basically and keep it the status
Speaker 1: quo until they hear further. Then there were two people
Speaker 1: who were who were authorized to start Operation Valkyrie, which
Speaker 1: was essentially a signal like you said that something's gone
Speaker 1: wrong and the army needs to regain control of the country.
Speaker 1: Um it was Hitler and Friedrich Frome. It was the army,
Speaker 1: Reserve Army leader and um if From basically said to
Speaker 1: the Reserve Army Operation Valkyries. In effect, the Reserve Army
Speaker 1: would fight whoever From told them to, which is Tom Wilkinson.
Speaker 1: If you're playing at home, man, that guy. He's great,
Speaker 1: great actor. He had this English accent in full effect. Heir,
Speaker 1: Tom Cruise is speaking American. It's all over the map.
Speaker 1: It's crazy. It was a weird decision. Lots of weird decision.
Speaker 1: It was at the time. I mean, have you seen it.
Speaker 1: I started to and then stopped. Yeah. Yeah, I thought
Speaker 1: it was a good movie. But I'm sure it was.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't remember what it was, but
Speaker 1: I just couldn't. I know that that Brian Singer, the director,
Speaker 1: made the conscious choice. He was like, I don't want
Speaker 1: everyone doing these bad german accents. Everybody do different weird,
Speaker 1: so just talk how you talk. And it's a little confusing,
Speaker 1: I mean not confusing, because you know they're Germans because
Speaker 1: they're wearing those fantastic outfits by Hugo Ball. Is that true? Yes,
Speaker 1: I heard that he was co opted but not didn't
Speaker 1: actually design the uniforms. Uh. I think it's probably like
Speaker 1: the Adidas, the Danzler brothers Rember their factory was co
Speaker 1: opted to make torpedoes. I'm pretty sure the same thing happened.
Speaker 1: But Hugo Boss's thing was to make the uniforms. Um.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I think it's true. I just wondered if
Speaker 1: he actually designed them. That's what I heard. That's what
Speaker 1: Russell Brand says, and by god, there's ever been a
Speaker 1: truth teller, it's that guy, so Truscou Kenneth Branda, like
Speaker 1: I was saying, he was the one that was really
Speaker 1: um opposed to the brutality of Nazism, and he's the
Speaker 1: one that developed these amendments to Operation Balkyrie for this plan,
Speaker 1: which from what I could tell, was basically two speed
Speaker 1: everything up a lot because they had a limited amount
Speaker 1: of time once they killed Hitler to pull this off.
Speaker 1: And I think it was like Operation Valker was supposed
Speaker 1: to be six or eight hours, and he was now,
Speaker 1: we need to get this done in like two or three.
Speaker 1: So those are the amendments that he created, I think so,
Speaker 1: in addition to some other stuff. But I think it
Speaker 1: was speed mainly, all right, which is ironic because it
Speaker 1: actually got slowed down in the in the in the execution.
Speaker 1: Um but the so again, just to restate because it
Speaker 1: is a little confusing, Operation Valkyrie was an existing Nazi
Speaker 1: plan or German Army plan for the Reserve Army the
Speaker 1: National Guard back home in Germany to take control of
Speaker 1: the country. Um in in the event Operation Valkyrie was enacted,
Speaker 1: and that could be because there was an uprising in
Speaker 1: a in a concentration camp. It could be that there
Speaker 1: was some sort of revolt that this, whatever it was,
Speaker 1: it was an official Nazi German military plan that existed
Speaker 1: that got co opted by the assassination plotters to tailor
Speaker 1: it so that they could use it in a conjunction
Speaker 1: with assassinating Hitler and basically trick the Reserve arm Me
Speaker 1: into doing their bidding. And everyone, that's three times now.
Speaker 1: If you don't get it, now, just listen to something else, Okay,
Speaker 1: go listen to Friendly Fire. He's talking to me everybody.
Speaker 1: He wants me to stop explaining. Will there be a
Speaker 1: fourth time? Okay? So, uh well, I guess we need
Speaker 1: to talk a little bit about Tom Cruise, who was
Speaker 1: sort of the main player in this assassination attempt. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we gotta talk a lot about him. This is the
Speaker 1: guy who was who's become a national um hero in Germany. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and here's a deal like history, and certainly that film
Speaker 1: painted him as a as a hero. I mean, he
Speaker 1: was a tried and true Nazi um up and you know,
Speaker 1: up to a point where he decided to kill Hitler.
Speaker 1: But he was not some like great guy who was
Speaker 1: always like, no, to think what we're doing is wrong, guys,
Speaker 1: we should really rethink this. His brother was his brother
Speaker 1: Barthold Am I pronouncing that correctly b E R T
Speaker 1: h O l D. Yeah. Okay. His brother Bart told
Speaker 1: his older brother Um was in this plot too, and
Speaker 1: he actually was um tortured and gave a confession. And
Speaker 1: apparently in his confession he said, you know, no, we
Speaker 1: generally agree with what the Nazis are doing. We just
Speaker 1: think Hitler is a little too um uh over eager
Speaker 1: over zealous about spilling German blood, uh and trying to
Speaker 1: conquer the world. But everything else we pretty much agree with.
Speaker 1: So yeah, these guys were they were Nazis, they were
Speaker 1: just anti Hitler basically. Yeah. So, um, Klaus fin Stauffenberg
Speaker 1: had been wounded previously I think in Africa, right, yes,
Speaker 1: under Rammel. Yeah, and was. Um. In fact, that scene
Speaker 1: of the film is really good, that's pretty accurate his
Speaker 1: his There's a bombing and a and a stray thing
Speaker 1: from a plane that he gets like full on all
Speaker 1: over his body, loses his right hand and everything but
Speaker 1: too Inger's and his thumb on his left, loses his
Speaker 1: left eye and as basically he's got two functioning fingers
Speaker 1: and a thumb at this point. Yes, not the perfect
Speaker 1: person to carry out a very highly technical bomb planting. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that's definitely going to come into play. But apparently
Speaker 1: um Stauffenberg, Klaus Staffenberg said, you know enough of this,
Speaker 1: like people losing their nerve, quatro bombs not going off.
Speaker 1: I mean, come on, if you want to done it right,
Speaker 1: just do it yourself. Is basically apparently what his policy was.
Speaker 1: He said, I'll do it, I'll kill Hitler. Yeah, He
Speaker 1: never said maybe I should just shoot him in the head. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Well he wanted to live, as evidenced by the actual
Speaker 1: plot that they came up with. Well, plus they also
Speaker 1: wanted um not wanted they they sort of demanded that
Speaker 1: that Himmler be in the room at the time and
Speaker 1: also be taken out. Otherwise, what's the point, right, So
Speaker 1: this July twenty plot that we're working up to was
Speaker 1: actually could have been called like the I think July
Speaker 1: second plot or the July eighth plot. There were like
Speaker 1: a few different attempts that were aborted, and one of
Speaker 1: them was because Himmler and Garing I believe or were
Speaker 1: meant to be in the room with Hitler and they weren't,
Speaker 1: so they called it off. Apparently Klaus Strassburg decided on
Speaker 1: his own, he's gonna von Stroffenberg. Straffenberg, I keep playing
Speaker 1: to say Strassburg um Straffenberg decided on his own he's
Speaker 1: gonna kill Hitler anyway, And when he went back in
Speaker 1: the room to do it after reporting that that Himmler
Speaker 1: and Garing weren't there um to kill Hitler, Hitler had
Speaker 1: just left. The meeting ended early like that. That was
Speaker 1: the kind of like luck that Hitler had. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: that was played out pretty accurately in the movie. Actually,
Speaker 1: um like he was like, all right, I'm gonna do it,
Speaker 1: and they're like meetings adjourned said wait wait, I have
Speaker 1: something else to say. Um, just to kind of reset
Speaker 1: with who the major or what the major players are doing.
Speaker 1: We mentioned Frederick fron him Tom Wilkinson in the movie.
Speaker 1: He was the head of the Reserve Army. And then
Speaker 1: there was another key player named Friedrich olbrick Um who
Speaker 1: was He was the one that basically was because from
Speaker 1: was like, I kind of know about this, but I'm
Speaker 1: not I'm not going to play a part in it,
Speaker 1: but I'm not gonna wrat you out either, So I'm
Speaker 1: just gonna see where the chips fall. Very cowardly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he he would have basically gone with whoever was in
Speaker 1: charge or whoever was on top, so he wouldn't report it.
Speaker 1: But he also wouldn't sign the order himself, which meant
Speaker 1: that Old Brick had to actually issue a fake order
Speaker 1: in from his name, uh mobilizing that you know, basically
Speaker 1: Operation Balkris in effect. Right, So Albricht from and uh
Speaker 1: Staffenberg were all Reserve Army high officials, and again the
Speaker 1: Reserve Army is the one who can take control of
Speaker 1: the country under operation. We should have a sound effect
Speaker 1: every time we explain that, maybe Jerry will surprise us. Um,
Speaker 1: all right, should we talk about the actual day on?
Speaker 1: I think we should? Alright, So Hitler is in the
Speaker 1: Wolf's Layer. That's where he spent it was, Um, I
Speaker 1: guess it would have been Poland. Huh yeah, East Prussia,
Speaker 1: which is part of Poland. Yeah, so that was where
Speaker 1: he was hanging out towards the end of the war.
Speaker 1: Heavily fortified, heavily on meth. Well, that would actually make
Speaker 1: a lot of sense, because he was increasingly paranoid. Yes,
Speaker 1: that's I think that's part of your evidence. Locked in
Speaker 1: a bunker doing meth probably doesn't help. In East Prussia
Speaker 1: they call it the East Prussia Blues. So uh, the
Speaker 1: I guess it's called the wolf the wolf Shanza in German.
Speaker 1: But give it some flavor the um. But just very
Speaker 1: heavily fortified, like his actual bunker. An area was like
Speaker 1: concrete with like steel doors. It was where that where
Speaker 1: you would keep Hitler at that point in the war, right,
Speaker 1: or where Hitler would keep himself. So there was on
Speaker 1: this July twenty plot. There again they wanted Himmler and
Speaker 1: um Garing, if not Gribbles too. Uh in the room
Speaker 1: with Hitler was the big one they wanted, right because
Speaker 1: he was the heir apparent, right. But if you'll notice,
Speaker 1: as many times as they tried to do this, um
Speaker 1: Himmler was nowhere around Hitler at this time, which is
Speaker 1: again evidence that Himler knew something was up and wasn't
Speaker 1: about to be in the same room as Hitler at
Speaker 1: any point because they knew that. He knew that they
Speaker 1: wanted to kill Hitler and take him out too, so
Speaker 1: he was just gonna let it play out. So they
Speaker 1: decided to just go ahead and assassinate Hitler at least,
Speaker 1: and this Wolf Slayer was a perfect location to assassinate
Speaker 1: Hitler if it was an inside job. He said, you
Speaker 1: could not get to him in there from the outside,
Speaker 1: but if you could get in, you could get to
Speaker 1: him really well. Because these concrete reinforced bunkers with steel
Speaker 1: doors that had no windows. If you set off a
Speaker 1: bomb in there, it would be amplified. It would have
Speaker 1: the the concussion from the bomb, the blast, the shock
Speaker 1: wave would have nowhere to go, so it would just
Speaker 1: reverberate around the room until it finally went out of steam,
Speaker 1: and it would kill everybody in there. No matter where
Speaker 1: you were, no matter what you were doing, you would
Speaker 1: be dead from this blast. So it was a really
Speaker 1: good idea. When they showed up on July, Staffenberg and
Speaker 1: his assistant with two briefcases that each had a time
Speaker 1: bomb in it with two pounds of plastic explosives, one
Speaker 1: of those would have killed everybody. They had double the amount. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and the guy that set this all up in the
Speaker 1: in the movie basically said that he was like, this
Speaker 1: is pretty redundant to have du with these, like in
Speaker 1: that bunker. One of these will kill everyone in that room, right, Um, Like,
Speaker 1: don't sweat it, guys. Nothing can go wrong, yea, even
Speaker 1: though you have to stick this metal thing in there
Speaker 1: and crack it with a pair of pliers and I
Speaker 1: noticed you've only got two fingers, but this should be fine. Um,
Speaker 1: nothing can go wrong. What went wrong was something that
Speaker 1: no one anticipated is that meeting and this changed everything. Uh.
Speaker 1: That meeting didn't take place in the bunker, supposedly because
Speaker 1: it was too hot, too hot. Hitler didn't like to
Speaker 1: sweat and he was loaded on meth. Right, So they
Speaker 1: moved this this meeting where they were going to go
Speaker 1: over strategy, like detailed strategy maps and everything, from this
Speaker 1: death inducing bunker to basically a hut, a flimsy hut
Speaker 1: almost open air. It was so flimsy and windows and everything.
Speaker 1: I think the windows were open too because it was hot. Okay. Um.
Speaker 1: The roof was just kind of like whatever, it might
Speaker 1: as well have been thatched. And then the the room
Speaker 1: also featured a table, a heavy slab oak table with
Speaker 1: heavy oaken legs, and that's what they had the maps
Speaker 1: out on that was this will be a big deal
Speaker 1: in a second. Yeah, So the plan is we we
Speaker 1: go in there. We uh they were gonna fake like
Speaker 1: he needed to change his shirt because he got some
Speaker 1: blood from cutting his neck while shaving. Yeah, and so
Speaker 1: that's where he would get some private time to um
Speaker 1: to activate the bomb. He knew he would have you know,
Speaker 1: ten minutes maybe less to get out of there once
Speaker 1: he did that. So uh they did. So they broke
Speaker 1: these capsules. Um went in there and the plan was
Speaker 1: that he was gonna have it set up where uh,
Speaker 1: he had someone faking a call coming in to get
Speaker 1: him out of the room, in which he would say,
Speaker 1: I gotta get to Berlin. I got orders like I
Speaker 1: gotta leave now, and Hitler would be like, uh, I
Speaker 1: give the orders here? Who told you to go to Berlin? Well,
Speaker 1: Hitler wouldn't know about any of this. He's knee deep
Speaker 1: and pounding tables and yelling. So um, they have they
Speaker 1: have the briefcases. They only get a chance because as
Speaker 1: there um cutting open the acid capsule on the one,
Speaker 1: I guess a century outside like called through the door
Speaker 1: to them, scared them. Yeah, they were like, hey, dude,
Speaker 1: the meeting starting, okay, so they had to head out.
Speaker 1: That was another thing. The meeting time change from one
Speaker 1: to twelve thirty because Mussolini was coming and they wanted
Speaker 1: to make sure they were done in time for his arrival. Okay.
Speaker 1: So um, they only got to activate one of the
Speaker 1: bombs and they just left the other one. They didn't
Speaker 1: take it in with them, they just kept it with them,
Speaker 1: So they were down to one bomb. They were in
Speaker 1: a different venue than the bomb had been planned for.
Speaker 1: And then now this heavy oak table comes into into play. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so while they were in there, they set it down
Speaker 1: near Hitler or you know Stauffenberg does. Um. A man
Speaker 1: named Heinz brunt Um went stepped close to the table
Speaker 1: so we could see things better, knocked over the briefcase.
Speaker 1: It's just so like, are you kidding me? With like
Speaker 1: how history plays out. He if he hadn't kicked over
Speaker 1: that thing, it might have still worked. But he kicked
Speaker 1: over the briefcase, moved it to the other side of
Speaker 1: one of those big, heavy oak legs. The bomb does
Speaker 1: go off, and Staufenberg gets the heck out of there
Speaker 1: quick like, and in his mind he's like that bomb,
Speaker 1: that explosion was massive, Like everyone's dead. Yeah, and when
Speaker 1: we're gone, he and his assistant. Yeah, So he heads
Speaker 1: out from the Wolf's Layer to a waiting airplane at
Speaker 1: the nearby air base to fly back to Berlin and
Speaker 1: start Operation Valkyrie. Right, that's where we're going to leave
Speaker 1: it for now. Yeah, we'll be back right after this, Okay, chuck.
Speaker 1: So Stoffenberg just said, off this bomb, He and his
Speaker 1: assistant are on their way to Berlin, right, Yeah, three
Speaker 1: hour flight and while he's in the air, Valkyrie is
Speaker 1: supposed to have started, right. But here's the problem. There
Speaker 1: was a guy stationed at the Wolf Slayer who was
Speaker 1: meant to report on this and basically say, go ahead,
Speaker 1: do your thing. Operation Valkyrie's a go. Hitler's dead, but
Speaker 1: they hadn't considered that Hitler might survive this assassination attempt,
Speaker 1: didn't come up with any code word for that. So
Speaker 1: the guy was just kind of clumsily like trying to
Speaker 1: be like, you know, things aren't so great. Um uh,
Speaker 1: something big happened, but not not happened happig So so
Speaker 1: they're like, we don't know what you're talking about because
Speaker 1: people are listening basically, so um. They the guys back
Speaker 1: in Berlin, these assassination plotters, these conspirators, get this mess
Speaker 1: and from the Wolf Slayer, and they still don't know
Speaker 1: what's going on. They just know something has happened. They
Speaker 1: don't know if Hitler's dead or what. So the guy
Speaker 1: is a Albricht who decides to wait until Staffenberg comes
Speaker 1: back to enact Operation Valkyrie. So there's a three hour
Speaker 1: delay between the bomb going off and the implementation of
Speaker 1: Operation Valkyrie. Yeah, and if you recall back at the beginning,
Speaker 1: they sped this whole thing up by three hours in
Speaker 1: the official plans that Hitler signed off on. So timing
Speaker 1: was important, So in Tom Cruise Lands He's like, dude,
Speaker 1: are you kidding me? It was three hours ago? Right?
Speaker 1: So um, that was that was a big problem with it.
Speaker 1: The second problem was that they didn't cut the lines
Speaker 1: from the wolf Slayer, and apparently even Gebel's like mocked
Speaker 1: them later after this. They didn't even cut the telephone lines,
Speaker 1: didn't cut them. They ceased communications. They tried to as
Speaker 1: as they could, but they didn't have control of the
Speaker 1: wolf Slayer. They just could. All they could do is
Speaker 1: kind of clumsily mess up the communications to delay it.
Speaker 1: But there was no radio silence from the wolfs Layer,
Speaker 1: which would have let Operation Valkyrie play out. Instead, Germany
Speaker 1: had a lot of conflicting reports and different things going on.
Speaker 1: It was total chaos. Is Hitler alive? Is Hitler dead? Um?
Speaker 1: Who's in charge? And so when when Stauffenberg gets back
Speaker 1: and finds out all Brick has been waiting sitting on
Speaker 1: Operation Valkyrie, he immediately is like, put it into into play.
Speaker 1: It's going um one way or another. We don't know
Speaker 1: if it's Hitler's dead or not, but we're going ahead
Speaker 1: with Operation Valkyrie. Because no one knows the Hitler's dead
Speaker 1: or not, so we could considerably pull it off. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I think there were um I think it was
Speaker 1: like Paris, Prague, maybe Vienna, where some of the strongholds
Speaker 1: where they needed these people to get on board and start,
Speaker 1: you know, gathering up the ss UH. In Paris, the
Speaker 1: quartermaster of the German troops there did receive the message
Speaker 1: set the coup in motion, and I think it might
Speaker 1: have happened in Prague, but like things were happening, but
Speaker 1: Berlin was the big one because they knew like even
Speaker 1: if they got Paris and the others like fully on
Speaker 1: board and finished, you know, with their duties, if they
Speaker 1: didn't have Berlin, they were still kind of screwed. So
Speaker 1: they they actually didn't have Berlin. It was kind of
Speaker 1: like a seesaw whether they were going to have Berlin
Speaker 1: or not. Um, there was enough confusion that I think
Speaker 1: the guy who was in charge of the Reserve Army
Speaker 1: at the time, um, I didn't know which way to
Speaker 1: go from. Well, yeah, from was the sort of coward
Speaker 1: that was just he just wanted to not get ratted out.
Speaker 1: He just wanted things to turn out well for him.
Speaker 1: So he um, he he sees the chance to basically
Speaker 1: realigned himself with Hitler because it's clear that the it
Speaker 1: looks like the coup's probably not going to work. So
Speaker 1: his allegiance is back a Hitler, and so he tries
Speaker 1: to arrest Staffenberg and Obricht, and they in turn arrest him,
Speaker 1: and there's apparently a shootout right in the actual War
Speaker 1: Ministry building. Yeah, because there were literally two different sets
Speaker 1: of orders official orders coming out because they were because
Speaker 1: of miscommunication. There were two different people controlling the German Army.
Speaker 1: We'll find the German government, right, And so finally there
Speaker 1: was a guy who was truly confused. One of the
Speaker 1: Reserve Army leaders was genuinely confused. He was trying to
Speaker 1: follow orders because he thought that there was an S
Speaker 1: S uprising like the Operation Valkyrie plotters had said. And apparently,
Speaker 1: uh he got on the phone with Hitler and Hitler
Speaker 1: said do you recognize my voice? And the guy was
Speaker 1: like yeah. He goes, I'm telling you to arrest these
Speaker 1: people that the Nazis are still in charge, and to
Speaker 1: disregard these other orders, to send them more crystal mess
Speaker 1: right supplies low uh uh And and here's the deal
Speaker 1: Hitler had ordered, um he wanted them taken alive, um,
Speaker 1: whereas From was trying to speed up their execution so
Speaker 1: he wouldn't get ratted out. Uh And basically, and and
Speaker 1: I think this is kind of true how it played
Speaker 1: out in the movie. Um, Chalfenberg is like you're going
Speaker 1: down to like you realize this, like nobody will be spared.
Speaker 1: So you're kidding yourself if you think this kangaroo court
Speaker 1: you're gonna run us through was gonna make any difference.
Speaker 1: So From said, Okay, well then I'll just have you
Speaker 1: guys summarily executed. Yeah what what he did? Yeah? This court, Um,
Speaker 1: it's sort of the definition of a kangaroo court in history.
Speaker 1: It was called the People's Court, which is kind of funny.
Speaker 1: There was no judge Wapner hanging out. There was a
Speaker 1: judge Freislow though. Um, and there's actually footage of this guy.
Speaker 1: He had this really shrill voice and he would This
Speaker 1: was a court where you would run people in and
Speaker 1: just have a chance of like conviction by hanging or
Speaker 1: firing squad. Yeah, there was a run by um Nazi
Speaker 1: fanatics and it was a court designed to try people
Speaker 1: who resisted Nazism. Yeah, and the sippen Hoff that we
Speaker 1: mentioned that all your family is guilty too. This was
Speaker 1: really where it got enacted, uh, the heaviest and I
Speaker 1: think like seven thousand people were arrested in this plot.
Speaker 1: Seven thousand people were arrested, five thousand were executed. Man,
Speaker 1: so they really went to town in that sippen Hoff thing. Um,
Speaker 1: they they took babies, infants and put them in concentration
Speaker 1: care for for children under sixteen. Um. The Staffenberg brothers,
Speaker 1: so From summarily executed Klaus Stoffenberg that night at the
Speaker 1: war ministry. UM. It's something I saw I thought was
Speaker 1: kind of cool. His assistant jumped in front of the
Speaker 1: bullets originally intended for Stoffenberg, and then they still killed
Speaker 1: Steffenberg anyway, but From was trying to cover up as
Speaker 1: tracks it did work. From was among the executed at
Speaker 1: this later kangaroo court. I think he was executed in
Speaker 1: March and as part of this the Sippenhoft. It was
Speaker 1: just basically if there had been any restraints whatsoever on
Speaker 1: Hitler in the Nazis in Germans or Germany, um, which
Speaker 1: you could really make the case like there really weren't.
Speaker 1: If there were, they were off now at once Hitler
Speaker 1: realized that this was part of a larger plot, he
Speaker 1: went berserk and it just became a blood orgy for him,
Speaker 1: just killing everybody, anyone he could find that might have
Speaker 1: anything remotely to do with this plot. He killed. He
Speaker 1: killed people who have been prisoners for years. He went
Speaker 1: through and did another purge of people who had just
Speaker 1: been in prison, you know, for maybe thinking of assassinating
Speaker 1: him years back. Totally unrelated. Um, they were just as
Speaker 1: the the Allies started to move in and the Russian
Speaker 1: started to move and they started killing people in the
Speaker 1: concentration camps, just stepping it up even more. And there's
Speaker 1: a there's a really good possibility that a lot of
Speaker 1: those people would have lived had that bomb worked, had
Speaker 1: it killed Hitler. Um, there's a there the the the
Speaker 1: idea that there were people waiting to negotiate a piece
Speaker 1: immediately a surrender of Germany. Um, all those people who
Speaker 1: died after July would have lived. Yeah. I think some
Speaker 1: of them were offered the opportunity to take their own life,
Speaker 1: which quite a few of them did. Um. Like literally,
Speaker 1: like here's a gun, just go in the other room.
Speaker 1: So Ram was a very famous example of that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think did he signide himself. He was given He
Speaker 1: was given the opportunity to take a cyanide pill. Um.
Speaker 1: Some Gestapo guys came to his house and said, here's
Speaker 1: how it is. If you're a national hero, if you
Speaker 1: if it comes out that you were part of this plot,
Speaker 1: people are going to start questioning Hitler and Nazism. So
Speaker 1: we can't have that. We're gonna give you the opportunity
Speaker 1: to kill yourself and we won't make your family part
Speaker 1: of this. Sippenhof will leave your family alone. So he
Speaker 1: chose to take his own life rather than um, rather
Speaker 1: than let his family go through this and and be
Speaker 1: court martialed and executed anyway, So he killed himself as
Speaker 1: a as a from this plot. Yeah, So there was
Speaker 1: a cyanide, There was gunshots that you put upon yourself,
Speaker 1: There were firing squad and then there was the meat
Speaker 1: hook hanging, which was um. Hitler would require that certain
Speaker 1: of these people had wire tied around their throat and
Speaker 1: then that was hung from a meat hook and Bear
Speaker 1: told von st Staffenberg was one of those guys. Oh brother, Yes,
Speaker 1: he was UM. He was strangled multiple times and revived
Speaker 1: so that they could strangle him again and Hitler. The
Speaker 1: whole thing was filmed for Hitler to watch later. So yeah,
Speaker 1: it was he went berserve after that. Apparently, if you
Speaker 1: went to go visit Hitler, you, um, even as one
Speaker 1: of his loyal like Nazi military officials, you had to
Speaker 1: leave your gun outside. Yeah. I think that might have
Speaker 1: been a rule anyway, because or maybe it was just
Speaker 1: tradition to leave your your side arm and you know,
Speaker 1: outside the room. Um, because they were doing that in
Speaker 1: the movie. Yeah, but you know, I think on Roderick
Speaker 1: Show he was like, well you could stick a gun
Speaker 1: in your pocket and your little guard, yeah wherever in
Speaker 1: your sock garter sure or your thie guard. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: depending on what you're into. Um, I think that's it.
Speaker 1: I'm surprised you didn't go after because, uh, von Strassenberg's
Speaker 1: family was not punished, like his wife died like ten
Speaker 1: or twelve years ago, right, but she was sent to
Speaker 1: a concentration camp and was liberated from it after the
Speaker 1: after the war. But they, I mean she went to
Speaker 1: a concentration camp for sure, his brother. I can't believe
Speaker 1: they weren't. He and her and her kids weren't killed
Speaker 1: though the spot Yeah, it's weird apparently the arbitrary and
Speaker 1: its just increased the terror of it too. You know,
Speaker 1: well that makes sense. So, uh, that is the July
Speaker 1: twenty plot. Okay, to assassinate Hitler. Uh. If you want
Speaker 1: to know more about that, go listen to the uh
Speaker 1: the friendly Fire episode on it. Yeah, it's a good one.
Speaker 1: And Hitler, by the way, he was gone I think
Speaker 1: nine months later, right, so it wasn't. I mean, this
Speaker 1: is towards the end anyway, but which makes it even worse. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, all right, so if you already said that,
Speaker 1: it means it's time for listener me so quick follow
Speaker 1: up on administrative details. We said if we forgot someone
Speaker 1: uh and lost Embarni wrote in and it did. Forget
Speaker 1: this one. Um. I sent an early color color study
Speaker 1: of my Pando painting and wanted to make sure to arrive.
Speaker 1: It's about three by five inches and an envelope and
Speaker 1: it did and it's wonderful and lovely and very sorry
Speaker 1: Lawson for that sneaking bias. I also want to say
Speaker 1: I got something from Alison Gallagher as well. Oh now
Speaker 1: he hadn't realized it, so thank you Allison for my gifts.
Speaker 1: Too nice. It wasn't just chuck that you sent stuff too.
Speaker 1: And you can find Lawson's art at Lawson Barney art
Speaker 1: dot com. Yeah, it's beautiful pain very nice. All right,
Speaker 1: listener mail this is uh. It was a very sweet
Speaker 1: sweet emo from a couple. Hey guys, Rightney, thank you
Speaker 1: for always being there on our long car rides. My wife,
Speaker 1: me and I have to travel twelve hours from our
Speaker 1: home in Butte, Montana, to Salt Lake City for her
Speaker 1: cancer treatment at Huntsman Cancer Institute every couple of months,
Speaker 1: and learning something new from you guys is always a
Speaker 1: welcome edition on our drive. I thought of her type
Speaker 1: of cancer h and the treatment as an interesting idea
Speaker 1: for an episode. She was diagnosed with a rare cancer
Speaker 1: called uh neuro endocrine tumor in ET. It's on her pancreas,
Speaker 1: but it's very different from and create a cancer. So
Speaker 1: when Steve jobs in a wreath of franklin um pass
Speaker 1: of this type of cancer, it's always reported the news
Speaker 1: is paying creatic cancer, which is incorrect and very disappointing
Speaker 1: because it does take away awareness from n ET cancer.
Speaker 1: The treatment is called peptide receptor radio nuclei therapy it
Speaker 1: works in a way that sounds like science fiction. The
Speaker 1: treatment is done through I V and is combined in
Speaker 1: two parts. One part is attracted to cancer cells and
Speaker 1: is welcomed into the cell. The second part is attached
Speaker 1: to the first and releases a small amount of radiation
Speaker 1: when inside the cancer cells. Very fascinating and my explanation
Speaker 1: is very much glossed over. Again, thank you for the show.
Speaker 1: Last thing, can you give my wife Mia a shout out?
Speaker 1: That is from bo Miller, so of course, Mia, Hey, Miya,
Speaker 1: shout out to Mia. Yeah, hanging there, guys. I know
Speaker 1: it's a very tough time for you, and I'm glad
Speaker 1: we can help in some small way while you're making
Speaker 1: these long car rides. And we'll look into any t
Speaker 1: for sure. Yeah, and thank you for reaching out to
Speaker 1: us too. If you want to reach out to us,
Speaker 1: you can find us on stuff you Should Know dot com.
Speaker 1: All of our social links are on there and uh
Speaker 1: you can also send us an email to stuff podcast
Speaker 1: and how stuff Works dot com for more on this
Speaker 1: and thousands of other topics. Is it how stuff works
Speaker 1: dot com. H